Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 1.djvu/249

Rh the reformed Chaldeans from any system of persecution which the Romanists might set on foot through the influence of French political agents. This could be effected in case of necessity by an application to the Porte through our ambassador, that they might be allowed to enjoy equal liberty of conscience and toleration with the Romanists.

"It appears to me that the above is the only plan, (I exclude not modifications such as the Church may see fit to make,) which on the whole seems likely to succeed in these quarters, and I propose it because the actual wants of the people call for its adoption. Several influential Chaldeans have begged me to endeavour to enlist the sympathy of the Church at home in their behalf, and I can reckon upon two or three priests and a bishop who would at once form the nucleus of the reformed community. … Such a plan as that which I have proposed would moreover in its workings be one of the most effectual measures that could be adopted for bringing the Nestorians in Buhtân and Bahdinân into communion with their brethren and the Catholic Church, and thus be the means of effecting another benevolent end which your Society had in view. The Nestorians in these two provinces were formerly included within the patriarchate of Mar Elîa, the patriarch of the plains, and are not subject to Mar Shimoon, the primate over the Nestorian tribes of Central Coordistan. These Christians are now left without any direct spiritual head, having only one bishop, who resides in Jebel Joodi, and who was ordained by the Nestorian patriarch about eighty years ago. Very many of the Nestorian villages in these two districts are consequently left without resident clergy, and are dependent for the ordinances of religion upon the ministrations of a single priest who travels among them from place to place. These simple people in their ignorance and helplessness fall an easy prey to the Romanists, who if they had possessed the means would ere this have subjected the entire territory formerly comprehended within the patriarchate of Mar Elîa to the Papal See. At present the Chaldeans have two bishops in this district, one styling himself Bishop of Jezeerah or Bahdinân, and the other Bishop of Sert, and several priests are abroad among the Nestorians endeavouring to proselyte them to the Church of Rome. Now, were it the design of these mis-